SueK

So pleased you enjoyed Study in Scarlet. I think it is a great thriller. As you say, the middle part of the story is very compelling. I hope you enjoy The Scapegoat. I found a copy last year in my local Oxfam and thought it was just brilliant. You need to suspend belief when you read it though.

Welcome hush hush and it's very brave of you to stand up and say you are a bookaholic

I finished the Omnibus of The Railway Detective last night (3 stories in one volume) and very good "ripping yarns" they are too! I've started on a kindle book today called Anastasia by Colin Falconer and so far it is very good and quite a new take on the old Anastasia Romanov theories. Oh, yes, my mojo decided to come back - I said "where the dickens have you been" ...... I'm making up for lost time and I've got lots of this :readingtwo: to catch up on.

I have ready all of MR James's short ghost stories (some more than once) and safely say they are creepy and can make you jump. You might be interested in this set of books. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1907360204/ref=oh_o06_s00_i00_details

There is a lovely version of Hard Times that can be downloaded onto the Kindle for 77p. It is an early illustrated version - well worth having.

Hello Fruska. The Railway Detective books are very good and I think there are about 8 or so now. I'm quite a firm believer in reading books in sequence and I would say definitely start with The Railway Detective as that introduces you to Robert Colbeck - from there you could probably read them out of sequence if you wanted. The omnibus edition I have has the first 3 books in the series. Thanks for the comment re my Sherlock avatar. I love the new Sherlock series but I too, only see Jeremy Brett as the definitive Sherlock.

I'm reading The Railway Detective (again) as I treated myself to the Railway Detective Omnibus at the weekend. I love stories that take place on Victorian Steam trains.

I finished a creepy horror story called Brodmaw Bay by F G Cottam last night. I've now started a very good novel called The Cyclist on my Kindle, about life in Unoccupied France in WW11.

I wish they'd all stop quoting on Twitter like we should bow down to their words of wisdom! If that pillar of virtue, JT, had resigned his captaincy, none of this would probably have happened and although Capello didn't exactly set the England stage alight, at least there would have been stability up to the Euros. Now, goodness knows how they'll perform with all this turmoil.

Soooo, who do we think should be the next England manager. I don't care who, as long as he is English/British. I reckon 'Arry, or Martin O'Neill.

Haha, looks like we've got a long wait then. :readingtwo:

is that when you have paid £7 ish (quite a lot for a kindle book) only to find it's on Kindle daily deal today for 99p John Lawton's Lily of the Field is on special today and his "Troy" books are very good.

This has to be my favourite of the Sherlock Holmes stories as you effectively get two stories in one. I loved that ACD went effortlessly from London to Salt Lake City and the American part of the book was so compelling. I thought that the second part was much better than the first and they captured Wraysford and Firbrace in the collapsed tunnel very well. I still think it was a bit slow going though (the TV not the book).

According to the writers, it seems we have all missed an important clue! Well I've been trying to ponder this and I can only think that in the original Watson didn't see Holmes fall to his death at Reichenbach Falls - it was assumed. Are we to make something of that do you think. Was it some sort of illusion as far as Watson was concerned. Oh dear, this is going to drive me mad until series 3.

I found this very slow-going too. It seemed to want to just present frozen tableaux of idyliic French life before the war and the stares into the camera were getting on my nerves. I find Redmayne's quite disconcerting to watch - although I think Isobel is very pretty.

My first read of 2012 was The Red Dancer a novel about Mata Hari who was an exotic dancer who was eventually executed as a spy in Word War 1. It was fascinating read.

Well I did manage to watch Part 3 on iPlayer last night and thought it was just amazing. So clever with the technology. I wonder if Sir Arthur would have used such information if it were at his fingertips at the time. Reading through the comments and re-winding the last 10 minutes does seem to suggest it was so well staged - I wonder if we would have noticed all that was going on just by watching it once on the TV. I won't have time to watch the other two parts before iPlayer take it off so will watch the repeats later in the year.

Thanks for that Ruth. I'll try to watch it this evening. I expect the 3 will be repeated at some point during the year on BBC3 or something.

I completely missed the 2nd series due to being on hols. I won't have time to catch up with them all on iPlayer but would you suggest I watch the last one only or do I need to see them in sequence to get the drift?

I am reading this book at the moment as it was to offered to me from Amazon to review. This is my first foray into Lesley Pearce's books and I have to say that her research is very good. I'm quite enjoying this book and I haven't read Belle but I don't think this really matters as the books stands up quite well on its own.

Oh dear isn't that typical. But you may be surprised because Amazon are keen for our kindles to all work. A friend of mine had something go wrong after the warranty ran out (by quite a while) and she got a replacement. So fingers crossed you get one. I don't know where I'd be if I didn't have mine!

I'm still wading through The Winter Palace - hugely enjoyable but I need to devote a reasonable length of time to it at each sitting and there's so much else going on at the moment. Will finish it this week (that's my promise) and that will take by tally for the year up to 50 (I'm sure that's a drop in the ocean to some of our bookworms on here ). I am then ready to go on me hols with a loaded up Kindle.

I've given up lending out books now. I hate having to ask for them back (like one year on ) I have given out some wonderful books only to have them returned with the spine broken, dog eared and even torn. So I've knocked it on the head now and say something like - sorry I haven't read it yet but I'm sure it's in the library etc etc.

Well my money is definitely on the Good Housekeeping Book. Of all the cookery books I have that is my Bible. I go back to it time and again for the cookery basics and some mouthwatering recipes.